by E.J. Peiker

1 Sigma 500mm f/4 DG OS HSM Sport Lens Review by Peiker The Japanese lens manufacturer Sigma has been around since 1961 and for much of its history it has been known as a company that makes budget lenses for Nikon and Canon cameras (and others at times). In late 2012, Sigma went public with a desire to no longer be seen only as a budget third party lens maker. They came up with the Global Vision line of lenses, new state of the art manufacturing processes and a vastly upgraded quality control process. The Global Vision lenses are part of three different distinct product lines. The Contemporary line stays true to the original Sigma concept - consumer grade lenses made of lighter materials at prices significantly below the camera manufacturer's lenses. The Art line of lenses was conceived to make the finest prime and short zoom lenses, lenses that meet or exceed the very best that the OEM's and even specialty lens companies make regardless of cost.

2 And finally a Sport telephoto line that makes high end long lenses equal in performance to what the likes of Canon and Nikon make. These three lines have become unmitigated success stories and has moved Sigma from the realm of cheap knock-off lens maker to an innovative high end lens maker that produces lenses as good or better than anything on the market. Art lenses are even on par with specialty lens makers like Zeiss and often exceed the image quality of similar Canon and Nikon lenses. As an example, their latest 85mm is considered an equal to the ultra high end Zeiss 85mm Otus lens at a drastically lower cost, and it has autofocus which the Zeiss does not. On the Sport lens front, Sigma made a huge splash with their 150-600mm Sport lens which I wrote about nearly 2 years ago ( ). Last year at Photokina they announced the first Sport series prime lens designed to compete with the latest super-telephoto lenses from Canon and Nikon. The new Sigma 500mm f/4 lens is nearly a lightweight as it's Canon and Nikon 500mm siblings, with superb weather sealing, very rugged magnesium alloy construction, and a new AF motor that has 33% more torque resulting in AF acquisition speeds equal to the very best.

3 In the past, despite excellent optics, Sigma lenses have been slower for initial focus acquisition. Both the Canon and Nikon mount versions of the Sigma lens use fully electronic aperture control - while this is not new for Canon it is something new on the Nikon side. It will increase reliability due to no longer needing a spring-loaded mechanical aperture stop down tab in the mount. The mechanical part of Nikon lens aperture control has long been a failure point on Nikon and third party lenses made for Nikon cameras - especially if the lenses that are subjected to a high frequency of lens changes. When first looking at this lens, it is easy to get overwhelmed as it has taken the number of buttons and switches to new levels. There is even a switch on the lens collar! Among the switches you will find an AF/MF switch, a three position focus limiter switch, an OS mode switch, a custom function switch, a beep on/off switch, an AF function switch, a memory set button to program the 4 lens barrel buttons and a collar detent click on/off switch.

4 Add knobs to loosen or tighten lens collar rotation and another to insert or retract rear element filter and you have a very complex lens. Sigma has gone to the trouble of labeling the switches and buttons in Canonese or Nikonese depending on which lens mount model you buy, therefore, the labels will have somewhat different names if you use a Canon mount or Nikon mount lens keeping consistency with the labeling of lenses by the camera manufacturers. The customization switch allows for three different lens behaviors, one the Sigma standard and two other customizations of AF and OS behaviors. A button activated feature on the new Sigma 500mm f/4 that is not available on Nikon and Canon 500mm lenses is that each of the four lens barrel buttons can be programmed for a different focus distance pre-set. This is extremely useful for bird photographers sitting in a blind with multiple perches. Each button can be programmed for focus on a different perch making it much more likely to obtain AF when moving quickly from one perch to another.

5 The user simply programs the buttons from left to right with the left most button being for the leftmost perch and then programming each button from there as one moves to the rightmost perch. The lens ships with a soft shroud type lens-cap, carbon fiber lens hood and large soft case with backpack shoulder straps. It even leaves room for an attached camera! This is infinitely more useful than the big bulky hard cases that never leave the storage closet after the lens is initially unpacked. The Sigma 500mm f/4 lens utilizes 16 elements in 11 groups and uses rounded aperture blades for smooth out of focus highlights (bokeh). It uses the most effective Optical Image stabilization in any Sigma to date and has positions for normal use and for panning. It is compatible with the Sigma USB Dock which allows the user to fine tune AF at 4 different AF zone distance settings (compared to just one for Canon and Nikon) and also allows one to fine tune AF speed, acquisition, re-acquisition, stabilization behavior, focus limit range sizes, and update the lens firmware.

6 The new Sigma 500mm f/4 uses a 46mm rear filter which is part of the optical formula and is required for optimal performance. Similar to the other 500mm designs from the camera manufacturers, a clear filter is included and a polarizer is optional. The front element has a coating that beads off water and resists oil making it very easy to clean. The lens is only compatible with Sigma's TC-1401 and TC-2001 2x teleconverters which are specifically designed to optimize performance with this lens. It will not work with a Canon or Nikon teleconverter. Despite this world class level of features and construction, the manufacturer's suggested retail price in the USA is $6000 which is over $4300 less than the Nikon lens and $3000 less than the Canon lens at this writing. If this lens performs, it is a steal (in relative terms). Sigma pre-sales vastly outstripped their ability to manufacture the lens so many are betting on it to be worthy of the Sport moniker.

7 If it does live up to the promise of the Sport lens line, then it could corner the market for 500mm f/4 lenses or at least force some price reductions from Canon and especially Nikon. Lesser Goldfinch (D500, Sigma 500mm f/4) Build Quality: Sigma has stepped it up notch with this lens compared to their previous long telephoto offerings! The build quality is every bit as good as the latest Nikon 500mm f/4E lens and actually feels like it might be a bit stronger with more metal which is backed up by the additional half pound of. The days of Sigma making lenses with tripod mounting lens feet that have too much flex seem to be completely a thing of the past. This foot is beefy although a bit on the short side for a 500mm lens but the Sigma replacement foot with integrated Arca Swiss dovetail is much longer and even stronger but does add about 6 more ounces - of course you would be adding that anyway with a third party lens plate. This is the same optional lens foot as is available for the 150-600mm Sport lens - be aware that the dimension of the dovetail is a couple of millimeters narrower than all other Arca Swiss style feet.

8 This can be problematic for lever clamp type of attachments but there is absolutely no problem with the normal knob style quick releases.. I find the Jobu replacement foot for the 150-600mm Sport lens to be the perfect foot for this lens - it adds virtually no weight and has the precise dimensions of an Arca Swiss style foot, unlike the Sigma foot. Size and Weight: A slight drawback of the Sigma 500mm f/4 lens is that it weighs a few ounces more than it's Nikon and Canon competitors although it is a bit lighter than the insanely overpriced Sony 500mm f/4 lens. Overall physical size of the lens is similar enough to the competition that it isn't even worth mentioning. Image Stabilization: Sigma calls their stabilization system by the moniker of OS for Optical Stabilization. The nice thing about Sigma Sport lenses is that you can customize how the OS system reacts with the Sigma Dock and its lens tuning software - an additional option that I recommend for anyone owning high end Sigma lenses.

9 The lens offers three OS modes: - Dynamic View Mode This is a very aggressive mode that feels a bit overly aggressive similar to very old IS systems where the image in the viewfinder can really jump around (similar to the original Canon 300mm f/4 IS lens) - Standard This is the default setting. According to Sigma, the OS effect is well-balanced and suitable for various scenes. - Moderate View Mode This mode offers an excellent compensation of camera shake and achieves very smooth transition of the image in the viewfinder. After experimenting quite a bit and doing some online research as well as communicating with other early adopters of this lens, I have found that customizing the OS system with a setting of Moderate View Mode gives good performance for Wildlife and Sports photography without creating a jumpy viewfinder - note that this is not the default setting that the lens ships with. With this customization, I find that the Sigma 500mm lens behaves very much like the Nikon 500mm f/4E lens or the Canon 500mm f/4L II lens and I can hand hold the lens and shoot at least 3 stops slower than I could with OS off.

10 Even though Sigma has always said to turn OS off on a tripod, they also state that it is simply to reduce battery consumption. They have always been vague about whether or not there is any other detriment, I find that the lens behaves similar to Nikon VR lenses - namely that if your shutter speed starts to get up towards 1/1000 second, you will get slightly better resolution if you turn OS off but it is really minimal and it requires some pixel peeping to really see any difference. If you do forget to turn it off when it's bright out, it really isn't a big deal. Similar to Canon and Nikon, Sigma says you should turn off the OS prior to a lens change even though few people actually ever do that! Rock Squirrel (D500, Sigma 500mm f/4) Auto-focus: Most people really only care about three things when it comes to super-teles - does it have world class AF, is it sharp and what is its weight? Lets tackle the AF question first! Once I customized the internal AF settings to Fast AF Priority for Custom Switch Setting 1 with the Sigma Dock, I found this lens to be the fastest focusing 500mm lens I have used.